The miniaturization of electronic circuitry and the reduction in size of light source elements have made it possible to place light illuminating devices on articles of clothing to provide for illuminated embellishments incorporated into a pattern or design on the clothing article. Often these light illumination devices include a flexible circuit board such as shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,480,293 issued to Wells on Oct. 30, 1984. Other articles of clothing embellishments can include a central module that produces audio tones synchronized with the flashing of light emitting diodes as shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,823,240 issued to Shenker on Apr. 18, 1989. The flashing of light emitting diodes can also be arranged to provide for an illusion of motion as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,882,865 issued to Andeweg on Nov. 28, 1989.
Presently, garments with light emitting embellishments either have the light emitting diodes mounted on flexible circuit boards or mounted to wires that extend from one light emitting diode to another light emitting diode. These assemblies constrain the position of the light emitting diodes with respect to one another and with respect to the central actuating unit. This constraint is acceptable when the light emitting diode assemblies are made for a specific pattern and the garment with a specified light pattern is assembled in a factory. However, when a person at home would like to install light emitting diodes on an individual shirt with a unique pattern these circuit boards and assemblies with wires leading from one LED directly to another LED can unduly limit the choice of designs which the assemblies can provide. Secondly, the installation of known light emitting diode assemblies are unduly complex for home assembly.
What is needed is a light emitting embellishment kit for garments and the like wherein each light emitting diode is independently wired to a central actuating unit. What is also needed is a light emitting diode assembly that is in a kit form that can easily be installed onto the garment.